St. John's opens Rick Pitino's tenure with impressive win over Stony Brook
Rick Pitino speaks to his St. John's players during a timeout against Stony Brook at Carnesecca Arena on Tuesday, Nov. 7, 2023. Credit: Errol Anderson
It would be hard to imagine a much better start to the Rick Pitino Era at St. John’s than the one it got on Tuesday night.
The Red Storm christened the season by playing the kind of game so many envisioned when Pitino was hired in March. They defended the full 94 feet of the court and made 11 three-pointers as they posted an impressive 90-74 non-conference victory over a better-than-advertised Stony Brook team before a sellout crowd of 5,602 at Carnesecca Arena.
Even former Storm star Julian Champagnie, in town with Spurs for a game against the Knicks, came out to see Pitino’s debut.
The Red Storm’s tenth straight season-opening win was a high-effort performance. St. John’s played the Hall of Fame coach’s trademark style and showcased many new players fans anticipated seeing.
“It was amazing,” said Harvard transfer Chris Ledlum. “We worked hard all summer, just for this moment and for the season to start. And it just it means a lot that we were able to go out there, play together and play the right brand of basketball . . . You can never really picture how it’s going to go, but it was exciting. It was fun to take it all in and we went out there and did what we were supposed to do.”
“The gym was packed today, I felt the energy from the fans and it was a great show,” Joel Soriano said.
Soriano, down 30 pounds from last season and now well-sculpted, had 22 points on 9-for-12 shooting with 11 rebounds and made the first two three-pointers of his career. Ledlum played a voracious style and finished with 16 points and 14 rebounds. Point guard Daniss Jenkins, who came over from Iona with Pitino, had 17 points, eight assists and seven rebounds. And Penn transfer Jordan Dingle, the top returning Division I scorer who has missed much of the preseason with a shoulder injury, had 13 points on 5-for-11 shooting.
The Storm (1-0) shot 52% from the floor including 11-for-22 on three-pointers and outrebounded the Seawolves, 43-30. They held Stony Brook to 1-for-11 from the three-point line in the first half and 25% for the game.
“I’m a big believer, as most of you know, in a three-point shot,” Pitino said, “but it’s only good if you stop it. Tonight, they made four and we made 11. It was a weapon.”
As for Pitino — who donned a black suit, crisp white shirt and light red patterned tie — he was also high-energy as he worked his team.
“He was intense today — he was on guys for every little thing we did wrong,” Soriano said. “We saw him getting fired up and he fired us up. I think it was great. I loved the way he coached today.”
“He had great intensity,” Ledlum said. “It was almost like he’d done it before.”
Pitino will coach his first St. John’s game at Madison Square Garden on Monday against Michigan. But Tuesday’s contest clearly inspired Pitino.
“It’s funny. When I was walking out two things came to my mind immediately,” Pitino said. “One was Lou [Carnesecca] . . . I was just thinking of Lou because he’s the reason this place is special and it’s such an honor to take over for him.
“And the second thing I thought of right away was Michigan. We know every game is so important. We think we’re going to be a pretty good team in January, but we’ve got to get to that point without taking too many lumps.”
St. John’s did a lot of things well but is very much a work-in-progress. The starting lineup against Stony Brook was Soriano, Ledlum, Jenkins, UConn transfer Nahiem Alleyne and VMI transfer Sean Conway. Based on the Storm playing plus-23 in Glenn Taylor Jr.’s 18 minutes and plus-17 in Dingle’s 20, there could be changes.
The Red Storm pulled away from a close game when Ledlum had seven points and Dingle had six in a 23-8 run that built a 31-16 lead. Stony Brook cut it to 36-30 on an Andre Snoddy three-point play, but St. John’s led 41-30 when it closed the half with Jenkins hitting Ledlum for an alley-oop dunk.
Soriano’s first three-pointer came with 13:18 left and made the score 63-43. After making it he pointed at Champagnie and smiled.
“He’s always saying I can’t really shoot, so that was really for him,” Soriano said. “I was just pointing to him so he knows.”
Eclipsed in the all the Pitino hoopla and this most-anticipated Storm season was that the Seawolves look far better than the ninth-place team forecasted in the Coastal Athletic Association preseason coaches poll. Dean Noll, who missed all of last season after knee surgery, can get his own shot and make it and scored 15 points. And Central Connecticut transfer Andre Snoddy – a former Newsday All-Long Island pick out of St. Anthony’s – looked like a tough physical matchup for anyone in the CAA as he finished with 13 points and seven rebounds.
“Dean was terrific. He’s a really good player,” SBU coach Geno Ford said. “He was a little tired because he hasn't played in two years, but he'll just get better and better.”
Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.
